EXCLUSIVE: Sony Pictures has acquired the Joe Haldeman science fiction novella Seasons, and will develop it for Michael De Luca to produce and Tim Miller to direct. Sebastian Gutierrez has been set to write the screenplay. The deal was made by Columbia Pictures president Doug Belgrad and production president Hannah Minghella, and Sam Dickerman will oversee it. Gutierrez’s scripting credits include Snakes On A Plane and Gothika, and he just helmed Hotel Noir. Alissa Phillips will be exec producer.

The novella, which is part of the 1985 Haldeman short story collection Dealing In Futures, focuses on an anthropological expedition to a planet with sentient humanoids that goes horribly awry. Haldeman’s science fiction novels include The Forever War.

This seems like the right visual tapestry for Miller, the visual effects wiz from Blur Studio who hasn’t yet directed a feature but is attached to several big-scale films that include the X-Men spinoff Deadpool and the Legendary Pictures adaptation of the Warren Ellis comic Gravel.